DPRK Briefing Book : Speeches of Kim Jong Il, Hu Jintao at Banquet

I have come to Beijing to express our regards to the new CPC collective leadership including Comrade Hu Jintao newly elected at the 16th Congress of the CPC.

I would like to express deep thanks to Comrade Hu Jintao and other Chinese comrades for the cordial hospitality they have accorded to us from the moment we arrived in Beijing.

Availing myself of this significant occasion, I warmly congratulate the new CPC collective leadership including Comrade Hu Jintao again on behalf of the WPK Central Committee, the Central Military Commission of the WPK and the National Defense Commission of the DPRK.

In a year or little more, the new CPC leadership headed by Comrade Hu Jintao has made a signal success in the efforts for accomplishing the grand cause of great prosperity of the Chinese nation in the new century, a goal set forth at the 16th Congress of the Party. The international prestige and influence of the PRC have been increased considerably.

The new CPC collective leadership including Comrade Hu Jintao have further strengthened and developed the CPC as a party serving the people, while sharing life and death, sweets and bitters with the people in the principles of people first and governance for the people, thus enjoying unquestioned support and trust, warm love and respect from all the Chinese people.

We fully support the cause of the CPC and sincerely hope that greater achievements will be made in the future in the building of socialism with Chinese characteristics under the leadership of the CPC led by Comrade Hu Jintao.

We are greatly inspired by the new CPC leadership carrying forward the traditions of the revolutionary forerunners in attaching importance to DPRK-China friendship, while treasuring it so much. It is the common will of the two parties and the two peoples to further strengthen and develop the bilateral friendship tested and established in all storms of history.

Speech of Hu Jintao at Banquet

Comrade Kim Jong Il, general secretary of the Workers’ Party of Korea and chairman of the National Defense Commission of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, is paying a visit to China with friendly feelings of the Korean Party, Government and people towards the Chinese Party, Government and people, in this beautiful season when the spring has fairly set in. I, on behalf of the Party, Government and all people of China, most warmly welcome the China visit of Comrade General Secretary Kim Jong Il.

This is the third visit to China paid by Comrade General Secretary Kim Jong Il in the last four years. This fully shows the firm will of Comrade General Secretary Kim Jong Il and the Korean Party, Government and people to attach great importance to Sino-Korean ties and develop the bilateral friendship and cooperation in a more profound way and on a higher stage in the new century. I believe that the current visit will be recorded in the annals of the Sino-Korean relations as an important occasion of further developing the traditional friendship between the two countries without fail.

The traditional friendship between China and Korea is a priceless wealth handed over to us by our veteran leaders and we should value it. To carry forward this friendship is a sacred mission assigned to us by the history and we should strive together to this end.

We have a duty, responsibility and reason to make the traditional Sino-Korean friendship ever more vital and active and further develop it in the new times and under the new situation.

China’s new collective leadership will make a strenuous effort to steadily consolidate and develop the Sino-Korean friendly and cooperative relations together with the Korean comrades “in the spirit of inheriting the tradition, facing up to the future, building good-neighborly friendship and strengthening cooperation”.

In recent years, the Korean people, under the guidance of the WPK headed by Comrade General Secretary Kim Jong Il, have continuously made a new vigorous advance in the cause of building a great prosperous powerful nation by overcoming all difficulties in the revolutionary spirit of self-reliance and hard working and positively finding out the road of development to suit the actual conditions of Korea.

We are sincerely rejoiced at your achievements. I am convinced that under the guidance of Comrade General Secretary Kim Jong Il, the Korean people will register a greater success in the efforts for building Korean-style socialism and achieving the independent and peaceful reunification of the country. More beautiful will be your future.